For USA readers: Seven NEX-7 with kit lens in Stock at Amazon (Click here).
Klaus from Photozone tested many NEX lenses on the NEX-7 and discovered that most lenses are still not good enough for the NEX-7. He still has to post the most important lens test, the Zeiss 24mm f/1.8. But there is another test made y the equally good reviewer Valentin Sama at DSLRmagazine (Click here to read the google translation). He says that the lens is worth every penny and the NEX-7 de facto deserves nothing less than a lens like that to express all the potential. The lens has almost no flaws, a bit of vignetting wide open that’s it. Even the bokeh is spectacular! Usually bokeh isn’t a key feature for a wide angle lens but it’s nice that Zeiss archived the perfection even in that aspect.
In Stock status
The lens is still not available everywhere (completely out of Stock in USA for example). Check these links to see if there one: [shopcountry 8450].
And the NEX-7 remains an impressive top seller. It surpassed the Fuji X PRO 1 at Amazon US (Click here to see the full ranking). And it remains on top positions at Amazon Germany (place 3 and 4), Amazon France (place 1) and Amazon UK.
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24 Responses
Klaus is certainly out to make a name for himself.
Sony Nex7 – the performer without lenses!
A good camera has a sensor with higher resolution than the diffraction limit for any lens. The camera should be “better” than all the lenses, if it is to record all the detail the lens can give and avoid aliasing.
The idea that the lenses are “not good enough” is looking from the wrong direction.
Seems legit
Maybe your logic is right, but having only two good lenses (24/1.8 and 50/1.8) isn’t good for a system. Let’s see…
The 18-55 is not as good (sharp) as other kit lens on other systems.
The macro would’ve been better if was longer instead of being 30mm; your subject has to be about 1″ away from the front element for 1:1 magnification.
The 16/2.8 is small and cheap but sucks optically.
The 18-200mm is great (especially for video), but it’s huge and expensive – awkward on a small body NEX body.
Same thing goes for 55-210mm, which is also big and pricier than other long zooms. In addition, it is somewhat dim at f/4.5-6.3.
So, not only Sony made only 7 NEX lenses, 5 of them have some kind of issue; 6 if you think the 24/1.8 is too expensive. If only Sony makes a 35/1.8 and a better (shaper and brigther) wide angle prime for the NEX, it would’ve been fine because you’d basically have 3-4 bright primes in the classical focal lengths. Then Sony can take their time building out the NEX line.
If Klaus tested the NEX7 with the Zeiss 24/1.8 against the a77 with the Zeiss 24/f2.0 which one would do the best?
24/2 withouth any doubts is a better lens, being designed for FF – it’s fully “operational” wide open, and from the samples I’ve seens could be one of the best, if not the best 24mm autofocus lens.
24f2.0 on nex7 a-mount adapter is the best
May be, but you pay with the weight and bulk. Together with the LA-EA2 adapter this lens weighs 755g (!) compared to 225 g of the Zeiss 24/1.8.
Love to see some testing with an NEX 5n.
“not good enough for the NEX-7”
Not good enough for people who do not know their equipment.
If you stop down the 18-200, 18-55 and 16 they are fine. They cannot capture every pixel at the widest aperture, but if you are going to share a pic on instagram, who cares?
I usually shoot the NEX-7 at 6mp, I only go up if I think I have something special. Why? Well, 6mp is really more than adequate for an 8×10 and I rarely print bigger than that.
Most of the time I share images on the internet and only need around 2mp.
Yet, the control and size of the NEX-7 are the reason it is my primary camera.
So Klaus and Andrea, please stop saying the lenses aren’t good enough for the NEX-7, when you mean:
“The lenses wide open are not sharp enough to resolve every pixel for a 1×2 meter print when viewed from 10cm.
I really enjoy the nex and enjoy the flexibility of the 18-200 and the 18-55 very much
@Jonathan Geach… I appreciate your point but I have to admit my biggest regret was that years ago I never use my camera to its full resolution. My reasoning for taking all my photos in 640 VGA was that I was mostly emailing them to friends and everybody at the time only had 56Kb dial-up phone lines to the internet…
I regret I didn’t take 2, 4, 6, 8, 10MB photos then and just reduced them with software…
Now all my old photos from around the world are still just 640 VGA… nice but regretful…
As someone once said… what’s the point of buying a 24MP camera and not using it to it’s full potential!!!…
I agree completely about VGA resolution, but 6mp will give me excellent prints, which is what I worry about. I understand many people want to always shoot at max resolution, but there is much more to the NEX-7 than resolution, in fact, many people were complaining that it has too many. So, if you feel it has too many, just turn it down to 12mp. I never heard people complaining that the 5D didn’t have enough resolution. Also, the D3 and the Leica M8 all came in around that level
agree x2
So using te full 24mp defines using a camera to its full potential? It’s not like smaller pictures would degrade the IQ in anyway…
I like to crop my pictures, in fact I put the crop tool on 90% of them, to straighten or to improve compositions. Maybe you’re the better photographer, but 6MP doesn’t give me as much “room” as 24MP.
@JonasM: you clearly don’t know how to use a lens then….Good for you you had the money to invest in a Nex7 but I guess a basic film camera with a 35mm or a 50mm lens would have been more suited in order to learn basic composition..
I started with film, developing my own black and whites. And back then and in doing that, we could change compositions too. Maybe you should go backwards to 35mm and just having the lab develop for you, I mean since you don’t take advantage of resolution in modern digital cameras…
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Can’t we all be civil about this ? What works for one person doesn’t necessarily work for everyone. If someone is happy shooting his/her 24 MP camera at 6 MP why should anyone object ?
I personally would keep the files at 24 MP since storage is relatively cheap nowadays and I always like to keep the RAW files on standby incase PP software improves and I can reprocess some old photograph in a better way.
oh really? A faggot? Is it supposed to be an insult? What’s the point? Where is the problem in being gay? Please let me know and all the “faggots” in the world I am sure they’d love to hear it from you 😉 Now Andrea would you please erase very quickly this comment if you don’t want your website to have trouble.
Well then Jonas if even back in the days of film photography you had to change your composition in the lab it must mean photography is not for you. Which is fine but frankly you should compose out there in the field not in the lab, that’s way too easy.That’s a simple rule of creativity. I do have a lab home and process my 4×5 and 6×7 thank you 😉
As far as resolution is concerned, I am still selling a huge number of shots taken with a Canon G3 that’s 4MP so nothing wrong here. Cropping an image is completly different!
@lulu why don’t you just sell your computer and get one of those printers where you can just insert your memory card and print away. Your shots don’t need work anyway, right!? Just go from camera to printer buddy and we won’t have to read your boxed-in and regressive opinions on here.
The ability to crop is one of the great advantages of higher MP sensors and most reviewers and professionals will point that out. If that somehow isn’t photography to you, then the problem is with you and your narrow and stale mind.
Go print buddy.
Photozone is using the Imatest to get their resolution figures. That Imatest simply doesn’t distinguish real resolution and the intermodulation components induced by the spacial aliasing with lower-res sensors using weak LPF’s.
Your title “nothing stops it”, is a very funny joke.
Should read, “nothing stops it, except Sony’s ability to produce them and get them to market with the NEX7”.